Live PC Give PC donation drive returns

The Park City Community Foundation is once again sponsoring the 24-hour donation drive: Live PC Give PC to help spread the word about more than 100 local nonprofit organizations.

From midnight, Nov. 3, to midnight, Nov. 4, 2016, donations will be accepted at http://www.livepcgivepc.org, with a minimum $10 donation required. Last year, more than $1.3 million was raised.

The organizations will receive the full donation, excluding credit card and website fees. The Park City Community Foundation is also offering prizes as additional grants to the nonprofits.

Community for Children's Justice

It's all about the children for Park City resident Susan Richer.

Richer recently helped form the Community for Children's Justice, a nonprofit organization to support Summit County's Children's Justice Center. The Children's Justice Center, working under the auspices of the County Attorney's Office, provides child-focused programs where abuse victims under the age of 17 can be interviewed in a safe setting designed to prevent further trauma. The center operates on the lower level of the Sheldon Richins Building.

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"We will do that by strengthening the overall support system of the center by helping them create a fully-equipped campus," Richer said. "They already have tremendous protocols in place, but they are located by the DMV and they have no privacy. Their space is ill-equipped and what they have is abysmal."

The organization will use Live PC Give PC as a soft opening to create exposure for the emerging nonprofit. Richer said the organization is challenging the community to raise $10,000 for the organization, which will be matched dollar-for-dollar.

"Oh my gosh, if we are able to raise that much money it will go a long way toward doing something because we have to buy the land and hire an architect and build the building. It's a lot," Richer said.

Community for Children's Justice is expected to campaign throughout the morning on Friday on the corner of State Road 224 and Kearns Blvd, in Park City, and in front of McPolin Elementary School. From 4 p.m. until 7 p.m., members are scheduled to be at the USSA Center of Excellence, 1 Victory Lane, in Quinn's Junction.

"The space that the Justice Center is located in now is substandard we can do better and we need to do better for the victims," Richer said. "It will take all of us to take care of these children. Please help the kids recover. We just need to build them a place where they feel safe telling their story."

Before 1976, if there was an accident in the backcountry outside of the ski resort boundaries in the Wasatch Mountains, it wasn't clear which ski patrol agency would respond.

That year, Snowbird and Alta Ski Area resorts decided to form the nonprofit organization Wasatch Backcountry Rescue to streamline the response to ski and avalanche accidents. The organization quickly expanded to include Solitude Mountain, Brighton, Park City Mountain, Deer Valley and Sundance resorts.

Wasatch Backcountry Rescue now operates in five different counties with the cooperation of nine different resorts. Volunteer handlers work with 42 rescue dogs to respond to search-and-rescue operations.

"I like to think of it as a rescue package," said Tracy Christensen, president of Wasatch Backcountry Rescue. "These are very highly trained professionals with experience in avalanche safety, backcountry awareness and the latest in shoveling and probing techniques."

Wasatch Backcountry Rescue is a nonprofit organization that relies on donations, especially the support received through fundraising events, Christensen said. Last year, the organization participated in Live PC Give PC for the first time.

"The support we received was overwhelming. What a great event to be a part of," Christensen said. "We are part of the backcountry ski community here and it was a very significant amount of our funding for the year that we raised, which is why we are coming back.

"It was just great to be a part of it and to raise some money for our cause along the way," he said.

The money that is raised during Live PC Give PC directly supports the training programs used to educate the volunteers and rescue dogs.

Wasatch Backcountry Rescue volunteers and rescue dogs are expected to be on the corner of Kearns Blvd and Park Avenue in the morning starting at around 8 a.m. Members will also be at Wasatch Brew Pub, 250 Main Street, in the evening between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

Since its inception, the nonprofit organization Canines with a Cause has paired rescued shelter dogs with inmates at local prisons to be trained before they are ultimately placed in homes with veterans throughout Utah.

But now, the organization wants to provide the dogs to another group in need.

Canines with a Cause recently partnered with the Summit County Children's Justice Center to begin placing dogs with children who are recovering from abusive situations.

Cathy Allred King, executive director of the nonprofit, said the organization has successfully placed dogs with children in the foster care system in the past and she figured "why not do this in our own backyard?"

"It can go anywhere from just being a comfort companion if they are afraid something might happen or give them the courage to go to court and help them talk about their perpetrator," King said.

She added that the organization is using the donation drive Live PC Give PC as the launch for the new program.

"Every penny is going into a silo to support this program with the Children's Justice Center. Not only is the funding super important, but it's also about just getting the word out and letting people know what it is that we do," King said. "Yes, we rescue dogs. But it's more than that. We repurpose them. We take them and give them a new purpose."

King said the donations that the organization receives through Live PC Give PC will support development of the program and the training of the first few dogs.

"They will really be there just to help take that edge off and help them relax," King said. "We want to keep these funds in Summit County and use them for training.

Canines with a Cause will host a donation party in front of High West Distillery, 703 Park Avenue, from 3 p.m. until 6 p.m.

When Lauren Lockey helped co-found the nonprofit organization Sage Mountain: An Advocate for farm animals, she said Park City seemed like an appropriate place to try and shift the paradigm of animal consumption.

On more than 50 sprawling acres in Brown's Canyon, Sage Mountain's animal sanctuary houses up to 10 farm animals at a time to show people "how social and connected they are," Lockey said.

"The question must be raised: why care for some animals and consume others? And we are are trying to break down those barriers," Lockey said. "Most of the animals we rescue come from factory situations, but even backyard farming is just as bad as far as the conditions."

Sage Mountain advocates for public education about the health effects of consuming animal products. Lockey said reducing "our foodprint is the goal."

Sage Mountain does not take donor surrenders or buy animals. Most of the animals that end up at the sanctuary come from other farm sanctuaries across the country.

"They all have the same mission as us: to only take animals that have come from a horrific situation," Lockey said.

The organization is slowly gaining ground and she added "it is taking time but it is a tough thing breaking down those barriers." Lockey, who became a vegetarian at the age of 11, said community outreach events and fundraisers are ways to share their stories.

Last year was the first time the organization participated in Live PC Give PC, Lockey said.

"It was a huge help," she said. "The donations help keep us out there with our school and pilot programs, in addition to going to the care of the animals and the upkeep of the sanctuary."

Sage Mountain will host an event during the donation drive from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m. at Wasatch Brew Pub, 250 Main Street, in Park City.

"We will have our table set up with computers where people can donate and we will have plant-based appetizers that they are serving," Lockey said.